CENTS AND SENSIBILITY
David Flynn has pared back his life to the essentials, sacrificing all to fund a training regime he hopes will qualify him for the Tokyo marathon
‘I WAS DOING 120 MILES A WEEK AND THEN LINING UP TO COLLECT THE DOLE’
LUXURY is a matter of circumstances. For David Flynn, a runner from Coolmine in west Dublin who has ambitions of representing Ireland in the marathon at the Olympics next year, it was the modest comforts he indulged in during a recent visit home.
‘You really appreciate simple things like being able to go to a nice coffee shop, or having a washing machine,’ he says. ‘You really start to appreciate things that you have.
‘The guys I train with, they need to perform to give money to their parents, or their little sister needs surgery. There is always something.
‘They get up and they have a motivation that athletes in our country can’t begin (to understand).’
Flynn runs in the Dublin marathon two weeks today, and the dream would be to secure a time good enough to win him a place in Tokyo next summer.
That is contingent on a number of factors, with qualification decided not just on time but also finishing position and on points that are distributed depending on the race and its ranking.
The bald Olympic marathon qualifying standard is two hours, 11 minutes and 30 seconds, but the runners that represent Ireland will not meet that standard.
For instance, to take two examples, leading marathoners Mick Clohisey and Stephen Scullion have personal bests respectively of 2:14:55 and 2:14:34.
Therefore, qualification will come down to running a time, Flynn estimates, below two hours and 15 minutes. Last year, he ran Dublin in 2:19:49, but he will toe the line in a fortnight’s time in robust form.
This is largely down to living a life that makes him appreciate a washing machine as a luxury.
He spends much of his time training in Morocco, in spartan camps in the small mountain city of Ifrane.
It gives him the chance to run at altitude, but more generally to devote his entire life to training. He runs and does little else.
‘I’ve spent the last two Christmases and New Years’ here on my own,’ says Flynn.
‘It’s tough, but when you start getting the results, you realise what happens if you can shut everything out and have your routine.’
Flynn will turn 30 next month, but the marathon is a new focus.
He was a talented schoolboy and youth athlete, and the steeplechase consumed much of his 20s, including during his time at the University of Arkansas.
Through a connection at his club, Clonliffe Harriers, he spent time running with a club in California, the Mammoth Track Club.
There, he met Deena Kastor, who won bronze in the 2004 Olympic women’s marathon, and her husband Andrew. The latter became Flynn’s coach. His dedication to the marathon and to the pursuit of his Olympic ambition means Flynn can easily rationalise the life he now lives, one pared back to the bare essentials. That is not to confuse his acceptance of the choices he has made, with blazing enthusiasm.
He does what he does, because he believes it optimises his chances of success.
There are dozens of elite athletes like him, desperate to make an Irish singlet on what remains the most prestigious stage in world sport. Many are unfunded, like him, eking out an existence on prize money and what sponsors they can attract.
It all puts the matter of sacrifice, a word tirelessly echoed by stars in more mainstream sports, into a stark context.
‘It’s something that took me a good while (to get used to),’ he says. ‘I was on the dole for a while, and you’re running 120 miles a week and you’re lining up at the post office to collect your money, and you’re wondering, “Is this how my life is turning out?”
‘People don’t see that. They see you winning races and on the podium, but you’re going up every week (to the dole office) and they call you in and you’re trying to explain the situation.
‘I found it very tough for a while. And it is still tough, because every cent is put into my trips, everything is budgeted. Me and my dad work together: he looks after all the prize money, he books the flights. It’s hard.’
None of this is delivered in maudlin spirit, though. Flynn says life is tough because it clearly is, but it’s as obvious that he is relishing the chance he has given himself to chase a shimmering ambition.
Running as well as he has this summer must help.
He won the Charleville half-marathon last month (ahead of Clohisey) in a personal best time of 63 minutes, 48 seconds. It was also a new course record.
A week later, he ran the Dublin half-marathon and came second in a time of 65 minutes, 48 seconds. He ran 23 seconds faster than his time in winning the Dublin race in 2018.
‘The reason for doing the Dublin half was that it goes on the course of the Dublin marathon, up a lot of hills in the first part,’ he explains.
‘I wanted to run it tired, because that’s what happens in the second half of a marathon, you’re running tired.’
The Dublin marathon is an event utterly transformed over the past decade. A record field of 22,500 will run in two weeks’ time, with the decision taken three years ago to switch the event to the Sunday of the Bank Holiday weekend rather than the Monday proving transformative.
It made the race much more attractive, particularly to overseas entrants.
However, the course remains a tough one, the hills Flynn mentions a feature throughout. The time of year means that it can be wet and windy, too.
There are much easier courses on which a runner could try and achieve Olympic qualification, but Ireland’s elite remain committed to what is also the national championships.
‘I’ve been specifically training for what the Dublin marathon is,’ says Flynn. ‘And what the Dublin marathon is to me, after my experience last year, is a race where you need to recover around 20 times during it. It really tries to rip your body apart, and then you’re in survival mode.
‘In the Berlin marathon, you have a totally different view. It’s a flat course, there are pace-makers.
‘Dublin is survival: get to a point and survive, is what I’m trying to do. There is a hill at around mile 22 or 23, and I’ve practised on a lot of hills. I do a lot of hill-work and hilly runs to get myself tired.
‘There is a certain feeling you get after running up a big hill and trying to get your rhythm back on the flat, and that’s what I’m trying to work on, to get ready for Dublin, so that I can keep with the lead pack on the day.’
He is on the taper towards the start-line now, reducing his mileage from around 120 miles a week as he tries to ensure his body is in the best condition possible.
For a man anticipating a test that ‘tries to rip your body apart’, he sounds excited.
Sacrifice has dictated his life and sharpened his ambitions.
Now he must try and reap its benefit.